Newport Comprehensive Land Use Plan - Existing Conditions | Page 129

9 Open Space & Recreation programming and users. These parks often play an important economic role in the park system, helping generate revenue, which can help fund the rest of the system. Mini Parks Mini parks are defined as less than one acre, with a limited, unique, or isolated address, can complement neighborhood parks in dense urban areas, and may include waterfront parks and driftways. Newport has 45 mini parks and open spaces of less than one acre in size for a total of 11 acres. This park category includes many open spaces in Downtown, along waterfronts, and in the central part of the city. This category also includes traffic islands, which are maintained by the Newport’s Buildings, Grounds, and Forestry Division. These small-scale parks can help fill gaps in park coverage, but they also add disproportionately to maintenance burdens, requiring more effort to maintain because of their small size and distribution across the city. National benchmarks suggest that a City of Newport’s size is under-served by mini parks (both year-round and in the summer), but these needs can also be met with other sizes of open space if possible. Neighborhood Park Neighborhood parks are between one and ten acres, are the focal point of a neighborhood with family activities, and are in walkable locations for residents. Neighborhood parks offer walkable park access and are key elements of a diverse open space network. Newport includes 17 neighborhood parks, a total of 73 acres. Overall, this quantity is close to the amount that national standards suggest is appropriate (96 acres), but lags summer demand more significantly. According to the Newport Open Space Partnership Existing Conditions Report prepared by Sasaki and Associates, the North End subarea has a low supply of open space, especially smallscale and neighborhood parks. These are the types of parks that are most important for providing walkable recreation activities for residents. Furthermore, the distribution of these parks is uneven across the city. The North End Commercial neighborhood only has one main neighborhood park (Abruzzi Little League Field) with one more on the neighborhood periphery (Hunter Park). In contrast, central Newport and Downtown have nine neighborhood parks. Community Park Community parks are defined as have between 10 and 50 acres, meet broad community recreation needs, preserve unique landscape, and contribute to a connected system. Newport includes 10 community parks. With a total of 332 acres, Newport is incredibly well-served by parks of this scale. These numbers far exceed the recommendations for community parks year-round and in the summer (nearly double peak summer demand!). These open spaces include a wide diversity of parks, ranging from natural parks like Gooseneck Cove and Ballard Park to parks like Morton with more recreational elements like playgrounds. Draft Existing Conditions (March 2016) According to the Newport Open Space Partnership prepared by Sasaki and Associates, The southern part of Newport benefits from a tremendous availability of community and regional parks. Mini parks and neighborhood park acreage well-aligned with year- round demand. With Brenton Point and Fort Adams State Parks, this area has the greatest overall amount of open space in Newport. Page 9-5